If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
I was at a gig in south London last week when, so to speak, my day job popped up. One minute I was "chillaxing" (as I believe the kids and the prime minister like to say) to some genial indie rock, the next ... I'm listening to a longish poem about Russian authoritarianism.
We have created a nation of children who have grown up around massive alcohol consumption. Huge. For at least the past eight years social networking has made it irrelevant whether it takes place in their own home or not. Everyone has a platform to share learned behaviour with susceptible peers.
The people behind these stories all have one thing in common (apart from an enthusiasm for guns) - an arrogant belief that the lives of other animals cannot possibly be worth as much as their own pleasure. The animals whose lives are in question also have something in common - they have all been persecuted to the edge of extinction in the UK.
It's a simple word, but these four letters quite literally mean the world to us. Everywhere you look, food (or the absence of it) is a defining feature of society. Food fuels us, sells products, titillates and amuses, provides social cohesion, stimulates endless foodie conversations and raises the 'celebrity chef' to an almost god-like status. A lack of food fuels hunger, poverty and even war.
A 'stress test', always makes me smile, as I have visions of a nurse bringing in the tax inspector or one's bank manager, a sort of Spanish Inquisition Monty Python style, interrogating the patient which is bound to heighten anyone's stress levels.
So why such vociferous reactions to the call for data to be disaggregated by ethnicity? Partly this reflects the practical difficulties in collecting and analysing data at a sub-national level in parts of the world where it is challenging enough to undertake surveys that simply capture national averages.
Shaker Aamer had been working for an Islamic charity in Afghanistan in 2001 when he was captured in Jalalabad and handed over to US officials. He was interrogated and then transported to Guantánamo Bay.
ONE's DATA Report, released today, a publication associated with berating the G8 for not keeping aid promises, this year turns its forensic eye on African leaders promises to the poor. It finds that $243bn dollars more will be available for health and agriculture and education between 2013-2015 if African leaders keep their promises.
Though the illicit wildlife trade is nowhere near as large and lucrative as drugs or arms, it is there: The fact that people don't feel the need to resort as much to the Dark Web to sell ivory suggests that too many loopholes in the law around wildlife trade are allowing people to disguise illegal products as though they are perfectly legal.
I want to share five stories of when people have used the social media website Reddit to unconditionally help another. The lesson is simple - if we all do whatever little things we can to help one another today, in the future we'll all receive payment in kindness; money isn't always necessary.
At a time when across the developed world public finances are under pressure, we must ensure our aid investments are cost-effective. Tackling child malnutrition could add $125 billion to the global economy each year by 2030. Yet only 0.37 per cent of aid globally is spent directly on tackling the problem. This is clearly a missed opportunity.
The backdrop to this challenge is that historic and remarkable progress has been made in the last 10 years to fight malaria. A dramatic surge in international funding and willpower to combat the disease has reaped major rewards for humanity.
23 May, 2013, Idlib, Syria. A young British-Asian Muslim from Willesden dies while working in a field hospital. Dr Isa Abdur Rahman was volunteering as a doctor in a country where medics treating civilians have been tortured and killed. Hospitals are routinely attacked and there is a dire shortage, therefore, of medical staff willing to work under such circumstances. Isa was my nephew. He was 26. His name means 'Jesus', who is also named as a prophet in the Quran. In the Quran, Jesus' death is different but he still dies a young man striving for good. Isa felt this was his 'jihad', his 'struggle for good'.
While the challenges we are facing, in the field of developing artificial life, are daunting, I have never been more optimistic about our ability to solve them. UK is definitely emerging as a biotechnology powerhouse.
It's been a real step back into history these past few days at the Paris symposium to mark the 30th anniversary of the discovery of HIV. To be in the presence of so many esteemed scientists who were working at the cutting edge in what were the early darkest days of the epidemic was an honour...
For the last three years Japan has been holding workshops to learn about how best to support people with dementia. It's their part of the version of England's 'Dementia Friends' programme where information sessions help everyone be understanding to those with dementia living alongside them. In Japan over 4million people have attended these sessions over the last eight years.
